To dissolve, submerge, and cause to disappear the political or governmental system in the economic system by reducing, simplifying, decentralizing and suppressing, one after another, all the wheels of this great machine, which is called the Government or the State. --Proudhon, General Idea of the Revolution

Tuesday, January 26, 2010

Hitler Orders DMCA Takedown

I seldom watch YouTube videos when I'm at home on my dialup connection, because they take too damn long to load. But this is great:

Addendum. Here's the script for a "Downfall" parody centering on the post-scarcity economy, by Paul Fernhout of the Open Manufacturing Google Group:

Dialog of alternatively a military officer and Hitler:"It looks like there are now local digital fabrication facilities here,here, and here.""But we still have the rockets we need to take them out?""The rockets have all been used to launch seed automated machine shops forself-replicating space habitats for more living space in space.""What about the nuclear bombs?""All turned into battery-style nuclear power plants for island cities in theoceans.""What about the tanks?""The diesel engines have been remade to run biodiesel and are powering theinternet hubs supplying technical education to the rest of the world.""I can't believe this. What about the weaponized plagues?""The gene engineers turned them into antidotes for most major diseases likemalaria, tuberculosis, cancer, and river blindness.""Well, send in the Daleks.""The Daleks have been re-outfitted to terraform Mars. There all gone withthe rockets.""Well, use the 3D printers to print out some more grenades.""We tried that, but they only are printing toys, food, clothes, shelters,solar panels, and more 3D printers, for some reason.""But what about the Samsung automated machine guns?""They were all reprogrammed into automated bird watching platforms. The gunswere taken out and melted down into parts for agricultural robots.""I just can't believe this. We've developed the most amazing technology theworld has ever known in order to create artificial scarcity so we could rulethe world through managing scarcity. Where is the scarcity?""Gone, Mein Fuhrer, all gone. All the technologies we developed for weaponsto enforce scarcity have all been used to make abundance.""How can we rule without scarcity? Where did it all go so wrong? ...Everyone with an engineering degree leave the room ... now!"[Cue long tirade on the general incompetence of engineers. :-) Then cue longtirade on how could engineers seriously wanted to help the German workers tonot have to work so hard when the whole Nazi party platform was based onproviding full employment using fiat dollars. Then cue long tirade on howcould engineers have taken the socialism part seriously and shared thewealth of nature and technology with everyone globally.]"So how are the common people paying for all this?""Much is free, and there is a basic income given to everyone for the rest.There is so much to go around with the robots and 3D printers and solarpanels and so on, that most of the old work no longer needs to be done.""You mean people get money without working at jobs? But nobody would work?""Everyone does what they love. And they are producing so much just as gifts.""Oh, so you mean people are producing so much for free that the economicsystem has failed?""Yes, the old pyramid scheme one, anyway. There is a new post-scarcityeconomy, where between automation and a a gift economy theincome-through-jobs link is almost completely broken. Everyone also getsincome as a right of citizenship as a share of all our resources for the fewthings that still need to be rationed. Even you.""Really? How much is this basic income?""Two thousand a month.""Two thousand a month? Just for being me?""Yes.""Well, with a basic income like that, maybe I can finally have the time andresources to get back to my painting..."

1 Comments:

Anonymous said...

Before there was "You CAN DO IT!" there was "And you can hide your pot in it!"

(shopkeeper telling patron the main benefit of the product he can expect if he buys it.)

Rob Schneider was acting out the typical SNL writer's pot-head angst (prolly Jon Stewart) but that scene (featuring Tom Hanks I believe) was so authentic human that it has stuck with me as a great example of the pedantic nature of teaching something you love. And learning at that. He was so eager. The idea that just knowing something was useful was a pleasant experience, well that's just awesome.

Now let's work on the emotional associations with these political images...